Travelogue Pt. 13

The Travelogue series recounts a seventeen-day-long cross-country road trip I took at age 21 with two college friends. We started in Charlotte, NC, and ended up two weeks and 8,000 miles later in Los Angeles, CA. The following is taken verbatim from a handwritten journal I laboriously kept on the trip. Names have been changed, but the rest is absolute, 100%, unedited truth.

*****

June 16

June 14

Woke at 7 in Corvallis. Down by 7:30. Slept so good.

Aunt Alexandra made bfast. Eggs, toast, coffee, banana bread, fruit, sausage. Good eats. Uncle Justin came down. Helped map out routes but talked forever so we didn’t get out til 8:20. So glad we saw them though.

Drove to Crater Lake. Incredible. The size of it is just incomprehensible. Sam said walls are 400ft. So steep, unclimbable. Water so blue but swirls of sediment, runoff maybe pollen. Sat at the lodge for a while. Wrote postcards and just looked. Baked in the sun. We had a truly gorgeous day weather wise.

Drove to Sun Notch. Very short walk up to the edge. Made friends with two older men doing the hike. Kind of creepily watched while we filmed video. The views were just absurd. Could see a rock formation in the lake called Phantom Ship. Looked tiny from our position but was probably massive. Full size mountain pines that looked like weeds.

Drove toward Crescent City, CA. Passed what we thought was some sort of cool cloud with rainbow colors shining through b/c of sun. Mushroom cloud shape. Quickly realized it was smoke from a fairly large forest fire. Sun went behind the epic cloud and became a perfect pink disc.

Entered Cali. All semi-delusional. Felt unreal to finally be here. Humongo trees all the way in.

Saw ocean first just south of Crescent City. Just had to pull over. Ran down to water. Cold. Surfers everywhere. Really fine sand. Could already tell just how diff it was than East Coast.

Had ridiculous views all down the 101.

Giant rocks stuck in the water. Cliffs overhanging the waves. Absurdly vast ocean with the sun SETTING on it. And then the road would cut inland, even just 30ft, and you’re back in sequoias.

Passed hotel, went to Eureka. Lost Coast Brewery. Very weird vibe. Spider on trip wire hanging from door. Got pesto pizza with spinach and jalapenos. Jessica bet us that she could easily eat a whole cheese pizza even after her side salad and one fish taco. Said she could do any human feat, mind over matter. Of course dared her to do it. Huge pizza but she did it, cried, gagged, but did it.